In an interview with David Gregory on Meet The Press, NAACP President Ben Jealous (pictured) said that Black Americans “are doing far worse” under the Obama Administration than when the president first took office, reports The Washington Times.

“The country’s back to pretty much where it was when this president started,” said Jealous.“White people in this country are doing a bit better. Black people are doing far worse.”

The black unemployment rate was 12.7 percent when Mr. Obama took office. While the unemployment rate in the U.S. as a whole is below 8 percent, the Labor Department reported the black jobless rate was up from 12.9 percent to 14 percent for December.

The worst during Mr Obama’s first term was in September 2011, with 16.7 percent unemployment for blacks — the highest since 1983, the Department of Labor reports. The black teen jobless rate hit a staggering 39.3 percent in July 2012.

While vocal Obama critics, Tavis Smiley and Dr. Cornel West, have 0ften been accused of being egoistical, attention seekers who “hate on” the POTUS when they insist that Black voters put pressure on him, Rev. Al Sharpton and the National Urban League are now following their lead, pushing for President Obama to present an urban jobs plan at his State of the Union address on Feb. 12.